Uh, Oh, I'm a Cultural Elitist

I'm no Pauline Kael, but I guess I'm not exactly a woman of the people, either, according to this Pop Quiz inspired by Charles Murray's "Coming Apart." I get a few points for having done a little manual labor and having once ridden on a Greyhound bus. On some questions you get credit for your spouse's activity, such as buying a pickup truck, but for hunting and fishing I guess it counts only if you do it yourself. Well, at least I have friends who are evangelical Christians and/or who disagree with me profoundly on political issues. So my score is "You can see through your bubble, but you need to get out more." I could have done better if I'd ever sat through an Oprah show or watched last year's Transformer movie. But no credit for enjoying Jeff Foxworthy? For frequenting Sonic drive-ins?

I knew I was in trouble when out-of-touch Michelle Obama took flack for buying Tuscan kale in a local farmer's market. We grow Tuscan kale and think it's great stuff.

11 comments:

I scored "between 13 and 16. In other words, you don't even have a bubble."

What I think is really true is that I just have exposure to both sides. I spend a lot of time with folks at the university, who aspire to the Left/rich bubble, and I spend a lot of time in rural Georgia, which is toward the Right/poor bubble.

Ha! Looks like my misspent youth, if not my advanced age and willingness to mingle, earned me:

Result

On a scale from 0 to 20 points, where 20 signifies full engagement with mainstream American culture and 0 signifies deep cultural isolation within the new upper class bubble, you scored between 13 and 16.

I'm sensing a pattern here. I got the same score as you three. But, but, but.....I like bubbles!However, I do wonder about the subjectivity of some of the questions, too. The first one that pops to mind is "have you voluntarily hung out with smokers in the last month". I have family and friends who smoke, and I most definately hang out with them voluntarily when they are within 'hangin' out' distance. But given that our current duty station has us iving 3,000 miles away.......Hell, I don't even know anyone around here who smokes. Which, ironically wrt my test results, isn't saying much due to the fact that, truth be told, I really don't know anybody around here in the first place.0>;~}

It's flawed, and since I thought that as I viewed the questions, I stretched the answer a bit where I saw fit (Some of those left a pretty narrow way to answer yes). Using that method, I scored 9-12, in a thin bubble, and keeping in touch with the other side. I suppose that sounds about right.

I scored 11. I didn't count youth trips via Greyhound and I don't drink alcohol, so no beer in the fridge. Skipped the movie and I don't have the time to spend watching Oprah - something about work to do and books to read.